| Cancer now is still one of the causes that threaten human lives. The combined therapy is accepted by more and more people. There are some researches indicated that the surgery, radiotherapy and chemotherapy can not kill all tumor cells, and it is the recovery of immune function that clears or suppress the remaining tumor cells after other treatment. That means the immune function is very important to the growth and transformation of the tumor. The minor remaining tumor after surgery is always the reason of relapse of tumor, and now doctors try to find some way to eradicate the remaining tumor.Doctors always try any possible ways to solve the problems that occur in the treatment of tumor, and there are some new ways in adjunctive therapies. Immunotherapy is a very popular one in the new therapies, and it is very promising. Immunotherapy activated the immune function of the patient, so the tumor can be killed by the body itself. At first the immunotherapy is used on the patients with advanced cancer. After the effect of immunotherapy showed, this therapy is extended to all the patients as adjunctive therapy. Most patients are diagnosed as advanced cancer when they visit the doctors and need to receive chemotherapy. Chemotherapy causes depression of the immune function, myelosuppression and impaired renal and hepatic functions when it kills the tumor cells. Immunotherapy can improve the immune function so reduces the complications. Now immunotherapy plays an important role in the treatment of solid tumors.ObjectiveNonspecific immune stimulator is still important in the treatment of tumors as an adjunctive therapy with good effects. In order to know better about the mechanisms of exogenous immunostimulant thymosin al clinically, we performed this study. In this study we observed the clinical effects and ran some lab tests to know the adjunctive effects of thymosin al on cancer patients with chemotherapy.MethodsEighty four diagnosed cancer patients hospitalized in oncology department, the first affiliated hospital of Zhengzhou University during Jan to Jun 2006 were divided into two groups. Forty patients treated with the combination, of conventional chemotherapy and thymosin al were defined as group A, while the other 44 patients treated with only conventional chemotherapy were defined as group B. Thymosinα1 was used 1.6mg ,s.c.,3 times per week, along with the chemotherapy for two cycles,6 weeks in all. The clinical effects and immune function was tested after two cycles. We took the vein blood of all patients before and after treatment, collected the serum and then tested the content of IL-2, IL-3, IL-12 and IFN-γusing ELISA. The results were analyzed statistically by SPSS12.0.ResultsWe tested the content of IL-2, IL-3, IL-12 and IFN-γand analyzed the results statistically, and we found that the IL-2, IL-12 and IFN-γlevel in serum of group A was significantly higher than that of group B. There is no difference of IL-3 level in two groups. Conclusions1. The use of thymosin al can significantly increase some stimulating lymphokines in serum on cancer patients after chemotherapy.2. By increasing the lymphokines of the patients, thymosin al can improve the immune function of patients with chemotherapy, which is important for the body to kill tumor cells and decrease complications.
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